In honor of today, October 9, 2018, the 20th anniversary of me and The Man, I thought I’d write about how we got this far.
I have no idea how we’ve made it this far. Marriage is hard. But I am thankful every day that we have both made the decision to tolerate each other. And it really is a decision. One that you have to make on a daily, sometimes hourly basis, that you’re going to do what it takes to make it work. Here are a few things that I’ve learned along the way.
A little while back, I was surfing through Facebook and I noticed that a friend had just published his first book. Being one of my goals, I was excited instantly and I had to find out more.
I sent him a message to ask about it, and wouldn’t you know it, it sounded almost identical to the reason I started this blog. I was on Amazon within minutes and I’m pretty sure I was the first one EVER to buy his book. I’m going to say I am, cause you can’t prove that I’m not.
A few days later, “Notes to My Son: Parts 1-10” by Chad Carlson was in my hands. I couldn’t wait to read it. I love the lessons that he so thoughtfully captured. Lessons that will help guide his son (and all who read it) through the journey of this life.
Check out the newest video a little further down…..
I’m going to start this by saying that despite my overwhelming lack of knowledge in other areas, I do know how to change a tire on a vehicle. And I’ve even done it. No, I’m not talking about the time that I blew a tire on my minivan by hitting the sharp edge of a curb as I was turning onto a street. It was a different time. A time that wasn’t my fault. Our neighborhood was still being built and a stray nail found its way into my tire.
Moving along; the first step once you realize that your tire is flat, is to curse a little bit. No, don’t do that. Check to see that it doesn’t just need air. Maybe you got lucky and can just put air in it. You should have a tire air pressure gauge. If you don’t, go get one. Then you can test the air in the tire. To do this, on your tire, remove the little plastic cover from the knob where air goes in. Push the gauge onto the knob and it’ll tell you how much air there is. If you’re not sure what it’s supposed to be, look in your handy manual. Usually though, it should be between 30 and 35 PSI (pounds per square inch). And trust me on this, more is not better. Kaboom!
Continue reading “Cleaning out My Closet- The Final Chapter”
Here is Part One of our story, in case you missed it.
First I’d like to apologize if The Man contacted you to ask you to harass me about finishing up the closet. I’m sure he hunted down a few of you.
Here’s what I did this week: The way that I do a lot of unwanted chores is by having other, even less appealing chores to do, and in order to postpone those, I do the first unwanted chore. Take for example today, I really should be cleaning a bathroom or two, but that’s way lower on the scale than cleaning the closet, so I’ll work on the closet instead.
I’m starting to see some progress. And the floor.
I have collected all of the unused and expired medicine that I found. After a little research, I discovered this from the FDA and that from the DEA to help you decide what to do with them.
You may have already seen that I happened upon 18 Oregon Ducks t-shirts and 8 sweaters. I also came across a pair of Oregon Ducks shorts and a sports bra. For any of you that don’t know me yet, NO! I did not give any of them away. I have a plan to make a T-shirt quilt out of them. Stay tuned for that. Some day.
The whole family is gone for several days, and after an entire day of watching the Rugby World Cup Sevens and eating as much as I could, I decided it was time to clean out my closet, and allow it to live up to its name, “walk in” closet.
Day 1: This is really going to surprise The Man. He’ll probably ask me again if we’re moving. I am not a clean freak. There are better things to do than clean. But every few years I’ll get the energy to clean something. This year will be our closet. Luckily, we moved here just over three years ago, so there is just over three years of mess to work on.
When I do clean, I like to make sections to help me get organized. There is a spot for anything that can be recycled (I may be a slob at home, but I still want a clean planet), things that need to be thrown out (toiletry items that expired in 2001), things that need to be given away (the bright yellow banana clip for hair that I purchased at the Goodwill last year, hoping to relive my glory days) and for things that should be in another room (why is there a drawer from the spare fridge in here).
I live in the desert. The desert is dusty. So very dusty. And all of that dust ends up in my house. We have to change the air filters in the HVAC system quite often. They can be changed every month or two, depending on how dusty it gets where you live. Sadly, I’m not sure if I can remember when these were changed last.
Today was my turn to change them, because I called “NOT IT” last. I guess this is another chance to learn how to do some adulting.
The first step to changing them is to vacuum all the dust from the cover grate. You do this so you don’t get a face full of dust when you open the cover. This should probably be done whenever the vacuum comes out to clean the floors, but to be honest, I only bring the vacuum out when we have people coming over to visit, and it’s been a quiet couple months. Oh, and that whole “I’m really lazy” thing, too.
I think that a sign of a successful adult is the ability to make your own spaghetti sauce. Okay, maybe not the biggest sign, but it’s on the list. Anyone can open a jar of sauce, pour it into a dish and heat it up in the microwave. Or if you’re feeling extra fancy, you can put it in a pot on the stove. But you make your own spaghetti sauce and you are a superstar.
How do you make your own spaghetti sauce? Not to worry, I got your back. This recipe was invented by my dear Mother-in-law, Ann. And then I tweaked it a tiny bit. Just to make it my own. But mostly because there were a few icky things in it. Here are the ingredients, the directions will follow.
Here’s my attempt at my first video.
CAUTION: There are levels of awkwardness in this video that have never been seen before. The Boy has PTSD from having to watch it repeatedly while editing it. Watch at your own risk…..
We made plans to have some wonderful people over for dinner on a Friday night. Their favorite meal; ribs. Smoked ribs on the Traeger! It’s one of my favorites, too. I start making plans to buy ribs, prepare the rub and let The Man do his thing. Only when I realized that Friday was a day that The Man actually works and that I would have to be doing it all myself, did I wonder why I hadn’t planned it for Saturday. But I didn’t, so I guess I had to learn how to smoke ribs on the Traeger. It’s a good thing I am in the mood to learn how to adult.
Step one- Ask The Man to write down exactly how to do it. I mean, exactly.
Step two- Tell myself that I am a grown-ass human that will indeed be able to figure it out. And if not, we can order pizza.
I see you’re hooked on becoming a legitimate grown-up. Good for you. Let’s continue.
Studies show that putting 30 egg shells down a garbage disposal all at once may plug your kitchen sink. Carrot peels tend to do the same thing. What now? Here’s what I found…..
Hey, did you know that in Canada (at least Manitoba) they call it a “Garburator” instead of a garbage disposal. Now you do. You’re welcome.
First step to unplugging the garbage disposal in your kitchen sink, is to find that metal ‘S’ shaped thing. You know, that thing you’ve seen around but never knew what it was for. Now is its time to shine. You open the cupboard door underneath the sink with the disposal and locate the thing (ours is black) that is right under that sink.
That’s the garbage disposal. At the very bottom of it there is a hole. Making sure the garbage disposal is OFF, you place one end of the metal thing into the hole and jiggle it back and forth. Back and forth. It may take a while. You can alternate jiggling that, taking out the tool and turning on the water and the disposal. Just DO NOT do those two things at the same time. Keep trying, you’re doing great.
